José M. Suso, general manager of Arrocera La Esmeralda (Blanquita rice), talks about a successful sustainability model based on shared value.
What is arroz Blanquita and where do they operate?
He was born in 1950 in Jamundí, Valle, after fifteen years before my grandparents, Faustino Suso and Blanquita Cárdenas, set up a mill in Buga; So they sent my father with his partner here to Jamundí. Today it is the oldest rice company in Colombia, as Valle del Cauca was the largest supplier of this cereal in Colombia until it moved to Tolima, Huila and Llanos Orientales. We are a company committed to the environment and the social part. In the world there are organizations that rate the triple impact, we write all this and show it to system B, which certified us as a company that does well in three aspects: taking care of people and the environment, and generating wealth to satisfy to employees, shareholders and companies that work around the company.
Talk about the environment. What have they done at the Casanare?
Five years ago we set up a plant in Casanare, which is the new rice department, the largest in Colombia, where 170,000 hectares are planted, compared to 4,000 here in Valle del Cauca. So there we have our whole topic of sustainable agriculture and it has been the spearhead of Blanquita rice. In 2013 we brought out the first organic rice in Latin America, we have bird-friendly rice, because we do not use insecticides or fungicides, we use them only when necessary and that they are biological or plant extracts, so as not to harm nature. With this we are promoting the orange industry with bird watching, which is the line that moves the most money in the tourism industry in the world: about US $ 80,000 million. And we do it through the farmers who receive the watchers in the rice fields, who are hosts of birds that come from North America or South America on their way north.
Entrepreneurs in the country have been asked to work on inclusion issues …
We have inclusion programs with former paramilitary or guerrilla combatants, we have Afro-descendants and indigenous people; there are opportunities for everyone. And that has been certified by Ecoser, which is a French certifier that gave us the endorsement of selling organic rice in Europe, Colombia and the United States, it also certified us as a For Life company for all these inclusion issues, to give the opportunity to minorities and train farmers regardless of their size, to have a fair payment project for all, since large and small receive the same price conditions for both financing and purchase.
Follow the news of El Espectador on Google NewsYou are a success story in productivity …
Long ago we managed to go from four tons – which is the average for Colombia – to eight tons of productivity per hectare, which has allowed farmers to be at a much higher level of income, and that has been achieved thanks to training and environmental commitment, because we find that more can be produced without damaging the environment. We are entering Bogotá, because I say, jokingly for Caleños, that exporting is arriving in Bogotá. We are opening up that market, because we have always been in the southwest of Colombia from the beginning and we had not set out to go further, as the first material was not enough for us. In view of the fact that we got into Casanare, we already have enough supplies, we have a very large plant, we are USAID’s ally, so with Harry Sasson we were in Alimentarte talking about the flooded savannas, because we are educating the farmers of the Llano in an agriculture without insecticides to take care of the birds there, where there are some spectacular birds. So in all this environmental movement, which has become so important, our brand has these values that we are making known.
When we entered the mandatory quarantine a wave of solidarity was awakened. What did you do when total isolation was decreed?
Not only in the pandemic and quarantine, we always have. We are a company of shared value, we always have help for street boys in constant programs, where we feed more than 20,000 people. In the pandemic, we made large donations to food banks, to the places where our merchants were, we joined with Cañaveral, Súper Ínter, Surtifamiliar, La Gran Colombia … commercial chains in Cali that made a union to donate food and there we delivered the rice. We are committed to a program run by Henry Aristizábal, a boy who has a kitchen in Cali and picks up street children, boys who are lost in drugs, takes them out, feeds them, and in that program we are several companies from Cali in a constant input.
Right now for San Andrés we deliver, through the Rotary Club, about ten tons that are food for 160,000 people; We also do it and in greater quantity to a region that hurts us a lot, which is Chocó, through the Association of Doctors Without Borders, who go on boats and planes to operate people throughout the Pacific, so we accompany them with a large number food.
What is this about a hundred Pacific mothers of the Naval Patrol and what did they do there?
We are very attached to the foundation that Paula Moreno, the former minister, has called Visible Hands. We are contributors and we support the Petronio Álvarez and there is also a lot of orange economy with gastronomy and culture with dance, dresses and music, and we support this area because it is our region. We gave this Naval Patrol rice, because they are providing health and food.
You talk about productivity, and there comes a great criticism from environmentalists, because in agribusiness too much water is used to produce, a resource for which we are fighting more and more. You are great, you have technology. How are they transferring that education to the small producer?
This transfer of education is our daily objective. Here in southwestern Colombia we have 670 farmers on 4,000 hectares, so the size of the largest farmer will be eighty hectares, but 80% of the producers have less than five hectares; So, we set up an education project, we have eight agronomists constantly visiting the fields, to bring the right products without affecting the environment and bring the technology. We have drones for fumigation and soil preparation with the best machinery. It is like an Uber of tractors, because the large investments are made by Blanquita rice and made available at an excellent price so that all small farmers have access to the best technology.
Arroz Blanquita won the Planeta Azul award in 2013 for reducing water consumption. In Colombia they spend between 24,000 and 30,000 liters per hectare and we lowered that consumption to 7,000; We are below the cereal production footprint for the amount of water required and that is thanks to the available technology that we buy it and put it at the service of small farmers. And Blanquita is doing the same rice in Casanare, where there are also large farmers who need someone to educate them, 300, 500, a thousand hectares. It’s like when someone has a cell phone that has data transmission, GPS, if we don’t study what the devices have to educate people, we can’t improve productivity. Farmers in our region are the highest producers of rice per hectare at the lowest costs. And that is very important, because the FAO sought several years ago for generational replacement in the countryside, because in the world peasants cannot inherit their children and they go to the cities. In the case of Blanquita rice, no, the child farmers have stayed to produce, because they are within a value chain of a company that pays the best price in Colombia and they are part of a productive, efficient and profitable chain.
You speak of company B, of technology, of knowledge transfer, of donations, of shared value. All this requires high investments. How profitable is the company?
As the company has always been aware that it is not a one-year and profit-making company, we know that this is built step by step. When we started investing in education, we hired the best advisers there were and thank God we had them here in Palmira at the Tropical Agriculture Center, where the most important rice program in America is located, but we had to make an investment to hire the best teachers and teach us to produce more with less. The results were seen quickly, because if a farmer produces three more tons and here there are 4,000 hectares that produce twice a year, then those tons are an additional 48,000 and that is more money for farmers, which is money that is irrigated between them . That makes them sustainable over time. Agriculture must be helped with knowledge, and the company has to see where it impacts and how it improves its activity.
What is the per capita consumption of rice in Colombia and if they are expanding, are they looking at the international market?
Yes, we have niche markets for organic rice and we have a highly valued rice with quinoa not only in Colombia but abroad and we are about to export. During the pandemic, we developed a very good rice wash. Per capita rice consumption in Colombia during the pandemic grew, because Colombians discovered that we have always had this product and we did not use it as it should be. Per capita consumption is 42 kilos per person per year. The world average is 67 kilos, so Colombia is below the world average. Asians eat 120 kilos and there are some of 178 or 180 kilos per person per year.
40% of the world population depends on rice for 80% of their diet, it is a cereal that is gluten-free, does not cause allergies, does not make you fat and has enough proteins for human development at any age. These data are so important that North Americans have increased their consumption from five kilograms to twelve kilograms per person per year in just 25 years, that speaks very well of a product that was not as well known as corn, wheat and other cereals. Rice has all those properties and you realize that Asians are slimmer, live longer and consume this cereal every day all the time. That checks the theory.
How many employees do they have? Where is the base of the organization and what business figures are public?
Five years ago we set up the plant in Aguazul, Casanare, and between the two plants, with the one in Jamundí, we have 350 direct jobs and 1,200 rice suppliers, 670 in Jamundí and the rest in Casanare, which in turn employs some 5,000 people; So, we are impacting more than 6,000 people in this country with our company. The company has been doubling and growing a lot. This year we are going to achieve perhaps $ 200,000 million in sales and we have not yet reached Bogotá, where we believe that the citizens of the capital and all of Boyacá and the region will welcome us very well, because when brands come with these system B stamps, from responsible company, are well received by consumers.